


T'ree Jägers in a Boat (To Say Notting of der Clenk)

by baroque_mongoose



Category: Girl Genius
Genre: Drunken Shenanigans, Gen, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-25
Updated: 2014-11-25
Packaged: 2018-02-27 00:02:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2671364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baroque_mongoose/pseuds/baroque_mongoose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Take one Jäger who is about to get married, his two best friends, a small rowing boat, and far too much alcohol supplied by Mamma Gkika.  Mix well.</p>
<p>Then leave it to everyone's favourite long-suffering British Ambassador to sort out the resulting mess.  Oh... and his dog.</p>
            </blockquote>





	T'ree Jägers in a Boat (To Say Notting of der Clenk)

It occurs to me that I have, so far, said very little about the British Embassy, although that is naturally where I spend most of my time. This is because anything interesting enough to be worth writing about tends to happen either on Castle Wulfenbach or elsewhere. However, for the purpose of this story, the reader should know something about it.

All the embassies are in more or less the same area of town (except the Dutch, for some rather involved historical reasons), and most of them back onto the river, including ours. It is a wide river, and the nearest bridge is about ten minutes' walk away; it would be difficult, if not impossible, to build another bridge any closer without demolishing buildings on at least one side of the river, and therefore there is a small ferry which runs from a jetty alongside the Russian Embassy to a similar jetty on the other side. There are two regular ferrymen, plus occasional assistants; normally, Georg runs the ferry from five in the morning until one in the afternoon, and Hansl takes over from him until nine in the evening. About halfway across the river there is a small island, just large enough to accommodate the tree that is growing on it; however, that does not interfere with the ferry route, as it is a little way downriver from it. It is, as a matter of fact, more or less directly opposite the window of my drawing room, which – like the rest of my official residence – is on the first floor of the embassy building. Almost the whole of the first floor is given over to my official residence; it is, of course, smaller than Blackrigg Hall, but the Embassy is still a large building and we do not lack for space.

I must also tell you something about NIMROD, or, at least, this particular NIMROD, since he is but the latest in a long series of interesting Heterodyne clanks. (On reflection, perhaps the adjective “interesting” may be superfluous here.) Many years ago, after I had helped Agatha Heterodyne to travel to England, she rewarded me by building me a clank; this was the first NIMROD, or New Improved Mechanical Reconnaissance Dog. She hoped it would help me in my spy operations. I very much appreciated her kindness, and so I could hardly remind her in the circumstances that the whole essence of espionage is that it is covert. It is quite difficult to be covert when one is accompanied by a wheeled canine clank with red panels, brass fittings, flashing lights and an impressive array of weaponry. I did keep it as a guard dog for a while, and it did very well in this capacity until it developed some technical fault and could not be induced to stop chasing its tail until it finally ran down.

Agatha, meanwhile, found the idea a regular and reliable source of inspiration, and went on over the next few years to build a whole series of NIMRODs. She gave the latest model to Lucilla and myself as a wedding present, and we were both very grateful for that, since she had moved quite considerably from her original concept of a spy's canine assistant to the more practical idea of a guard dog, and built accordingly. This NIMROD had much sleeker lines than the original, was green rather than red, and was heavy on the sensory equipment as well as the weapons. We had not, of course, taken him to Venice with us on our honeymoon; instead, we had left him to help look after Agatha and Alice, my two daughters from my first marriage.

Now, it so happened that Agatha Heterodyne, together with a large party from Mechanicsburg, was here – that is to say, of course, directly overhead on Castle Wulfenbach – on a pleasant evening in the middle of May, a couple of months after our return from Venice. There was to be another wedding, and this time it was Maxim's. Rather to everyone's surprise, he had decided to take the plunge and tie the knot with General Hildegard von Donau; or perhaps, of course, _she_ had decided, for she was quite as formidable as any Jäger I knew. There is something bittersweet about a person who is effectively immortal marrying one who is not, but, more to the point, there had been a lot of diplomatic negotiations about it between Gil and Agatha, in some of which I had been called to assist. (Not that it was anything remotely to do with Britain, of course; but both parties saw me as a friend and a fair-minded person.) After all, Agatha did not want to lose her Jäger, and Gil did not want to lose his General. But, in the end, we had finally reached a settlement. The General would go and live in Mechanicsburg with Maxim, provided it was understood by all parties that she was permanently on call whenever Gil needed her. It was as happy a compromise as anyone was going to get without Gil and Agatha deciding to get married themselves; of course, I could hardly suggest that out loud, but I suspect I may have hinted in that direction once or twice.

I had been on Castle Wulfenbach that morning, greeting Agatha and some of the other guests, and then returned to the embassy at lunchtime so that I could do some paperwork in the afternoon. There had been no sign of the happy bridegroom, nor indeed of Dimo and Oggie, but Agatha had explained that they were out having a bachelor party in the town. In former times that would have had me worried, but not now; Agatha was here often enough that everyone here knew her Jägers and understood that, formidable fighters though they were, they were not gratuitously violent. Except with one another, obviously, but that was just fun as far as they were concerned.

So, now, I was sitting in the drawing room finishing a chapter of a novel before retiring for the night, and Lucilla was sitting in the chair on the other side of the fire working at her lace pillow. She was not one for wearing much lace herself, but she was extremely good at making it, a skill which had done more than anything else to warm Alice to her new stepmother. Alice was one of those extremely frilly little girls, quite unlike her sister, who was bright and tomboyish and who everyone said looked exactly like a small female version of myself. I think she looks more like my niece Harriet, but darker; Harriet has her mother's colouring. Still, I suppose most of the people who thought she looked like me had not seen Harriet.

And then I heard the singing.

_“Vieni sul mar!  
Vien...”_

That was all, but it was quite enough. “Great Scott!” I exclaimed. “That's Maxim's voice. And if I'm not mistaken, it's coming from the river.”

Lucilla looked up. “I didn't know Maxim could sing in Italian,” she said.

“I knew he could, but I'm surprised he is doing so at this particular moment,” I replied. “He sounds drunk to me.”

“I thought you said they had an almost unlimited capacity for alcohol, darling?”

“Well... they do appear to have been celebrating all day,” I said. “I'd better have a look.” I went to the window and pulled back the curtain.

“Well?” asked Lucilla, deftly swapping bobbins back and forth.

“This is no good,” I said. “I can't see a blessed thing. NIMROD, come here a moment, will you?”

The clank rolled quietly across the carpet. “Yes, Master?”

“You've got a searchlight, yes? Can you direct it out of the window, or is it out of range for you?”

“I can do that, Master.” NIMROD was suddenly on a level with my shoulder; I looked down, and saw that he had raised himself up on a set of four collapsible metal struts. We were still finding out exactly what NIMROD could and could not do, and the former list was proving to be a good deal longer than the latter.

He shone the searchlight out over the dark water, and as it hit the little island, I stopped him. There they were.

Maxim was wrapped in everlasting amity around the tree on the island, apparently now sharing his deepest confidences with it. Oggie was perched on one of its roots with his forked feet dangling in the water, gazing into the depths of a large barrel, although from here I could not make out the expression on his face. And Dimo was lying in the bottom of the rowing boat which had brought them to the island, sound asleep as far as I could see, with his hat over his face.

There was no sign of any oars.

“Oh, my,” I said. “I'm afraid our Jäger friends have got themselves into a mess, and, what's more, they're so drunk they don't even realise it.”

Lucilla came to look. “Oh, dear. Yes. That boat could drift free at any time, and from the look of them, none of them would notice. Especially not Dimo.”

I nodded. “Well, there's no time to go and roust out Hansl. I don't even know where he lives, except that it's on the far side of the river. I'd better see what I can do myself. Come on, NIMROD. I'm going to need you and your searchlight.”

“Yes, well, I'm very glad you are taking NIMROD, because those boys are so drunk they're likely to forget you're not a Jäger yourself,” said Lucilla. “NIMROD, look after him.”

“Yes, Mistress,” said NIMROD obediently.

NIMROD, as I have said, has wheels, but there is a lift and so we used that. There is an official Embassy launch, but I could not possibly sail her on my own, and, even if I could, she was too big for me to rescue three people who were probably not in a state to climb a rope ladder at the moment. So, instead, I ran for the life dinghy, which is always kept moored near the jetty in case the ferry should meet with any accident.

NIMROD is very heavy, and I had some trouble getting him aboard; but I think the urgency of Dimo's case gave me added strength. “I need you to steer me, NIMROD,” I said. “Keep the light trained on those three and help me get to them as quickly as possible.”

I would not have done it without him, or, perhaps, I would have run aground on the island myself; the night was overcast and pitch black, and there were few lights from the buildings at this time of night. Maxim sang some snatch about _l'abbraccia del tuo marinar_ , then faded uncertainly into silence again.

Then I heard Oggie's voice. “Hey,” he said. “Hey. Maxim.”

“Goot times,” replied Maxim happily. “Dot... dot schtuff of Mamma's... ho ja.” He hiccupped.

Ah. Now _that_ explained a good deal. If Mamma Gkika had sent Maxim a little something for his bachelor party, no wonder the three Jägers were all rolling drunk. No doubt that was what had been in the barrel.

“No, but, hey, Maxim,” said Oggie. “Uh.”

“Vot?” asked Maxim dreamily. “Hey. Hy know some more Italian songs. Hy yust dun know dem right dis minute.”

“Ve... ve got no drink left, Maxim.”

“Iz no problem. Ve get some more. Hey! Iz all goot. _I'te vurria..._ jaaaaaaa. Hic.”

“Iz notting in der barrel,” said Oggie, tragically.

“Iz odder barrels. _Caro mio ben..._ ach, no. Hy dun vant to sing about Ben. Hy dun know who der dumboozle Ben iz anyvay.”

“But, Maxim,” said Oggie, “ _vhere_ iz de odder barrels?”

At this point, I pulled up alongside Dimo in the boat. “Chaps!” I said. “You need to come with me. I don't know if you realise this, but you've lost your oars and this boat isn't tied up.” I was already securing it firmly to the dinghy; Dimo was still completely oblivious, and I could now hear that he was snoring heavily.

“Oh, hey! Iz der Earl,” said Maxim happily. “Iz goot to see hyu. But ve iz fine here.”

“No, Maxim,” I insisted. “You are marooned on a little island in the middle of the river, and you have no way of getting off without help. Unless you swim for it, of course, but I wouldn't recommend that here even for a sober Jäger. There are some very nasty undercurrents. And you, I'm afraid, are nowhere near being a sober Jäger right now.”

“Iz only vun barrel here, Mister Vooster,” said Oggie solemnly, showing it to me. “Und iz empty.”

“Well, then, why don't you put it in the rowing boat and get in with Dimo?” I suggested. I have had to deal with very drunk people before, and sometimes I find that any kindly meant suggestion will work if it is offered in a tone of voice which implies that it is the only logical answer to what they have just said.

It worked this time. “Ho, ja. Hokay, den, Mister Vooster.”

Oggie got into the rowing boat very clumsily, along with the barrel; this, of course, meant he both splashed Dimo and almost fell over him. He woke, grumbling and swearing.

“Eediot,” he slurred. “Der sh...” He blinked, noticing me for the first time. “Der schtuff hy got to put up vit,” he amended. “Goot to see hyu, Earl, but vot hyu doink here?”

“Rescuing you, Dimo,” I said. “That boat wasn't moored, you've lost your oars, and you fell asleep in it. You could very easily have been swept off down river.”

He rubbed his forehead. “Vot? Gott's leetle fish in trousers! Hy need a drink.”

“I do believe that's the last thing you need at this moment, Dimo,” I replied. “Come on, Maxim. We're waiting for you.”

“Hy fine,” Maxim insisted, with a grin. He was still clinging to the tree.

“Maxim!” I said. “You are _not_ fine. You need to come with me. Listen, you know I don't go ordering you about without a good reason. If I say you've got to come, understand that you're not safe where you are.”

Oggie chose this moment to say something so unhelpful that if he had not been a Jäger, and a very drunk one at that, I might have been tempted to hit him. “Iz all right, Maxim,” he said. “Ve yust go und get some more barrels. Ve be right back.”

“Dis iz gettink schtupid,” muttered Dimo. “Hy goink back to sleep.”

Well, Dimo was certainly right about that. I stared helplessly at Maxim. It was clear he wouldn't come with us of his own accord, and I doubted that with all my diplomatic skills I could persuade the other two to go and drag him into one of the boats; and there was certainly no way I could drag him.

And then, suddenly, inspiration struck.

“Dimo,” I said. “Before you go back to sleep, would you mind just doing something for me? Could you please lift NIMROD here out of the boat and put him down on the island?”

“Ho ja, no problem,” replied Dimo, and did so effortlessly.

“Thank you, Dimo.” I grinned. “Now. NIMROD – fetch!”

Generally speaking, in any battle between a clank and a Jäger, there is only ever going to be one winner, at least unless the clank in question is a massive battle clank of the sort that has people controlling it from the inside. But this was Agatha Heterodyne's latest model, she is possibly the strongest spark on the planet, and by this stage she had been building clanks for something like twenty years. Also, it was up against an exceedingly drunk and confused Jäger.

Maxim, to cut a long story short, was fetched.

Unfortunately, so was the tree, which made for complications; the rowing boat sank in the confusion and I had to haul Dimo and Oggie aboard the dinghy, but by this time Oggie had got the idea into his head that the tree was fighting Maxim, and he was still able to wield his triple halberd with considerable accuracy even in the state he was in. This was just as well, because I could not stop him, and at one point I was terrified that he would accidentally have Maxim's head off. Finally, however, I had all three Jägers in the dinghy without too many accompanying bits of tree, and Dimo lifted NIMROD back aboard for me. The dousing had sobered him up considerably, and he gave me a rueful look from under his ragged black fringe.

“Ve vos eediots,” he admitted.

“Well, yes, you were rather,” I replied, “but you're all safe now, and that's the main thing. Next time you want to get yourselves drunk, do it on land, all right?”

Oggie was still clutching the remains of the barrel. “Iz more barrels?” he enquired. Dimo cuffed him.

“Whose was the boat, by the way?” I asked.

Dimo looked uncomfortable. “Ve hired it. Guess ve goink to haff to pay for it now.”

“Oh, well,” I said. “They're not very expensive round here. There are a lot of little boats around like that one.”

Maxim was still looking remarkably happy; of course, he was getting married the next day, and he was the only one of the three who had managed to avoid ending up in the river. “Hy pay for dat,” he said. “Iz my party. No problem.” He blinked owlishly at me. “Hey, Earl. Hyu know der vords to _Torna a Surriento?”_

“Not off the top of my head, no, and why all the Italian songs tonight, Maxim?”

“Iz der most romantic langvage! Hy iz der bridegroom, remember?”

“Iz a schtupid langvage for a Jäger,” Dimo grumbled. “Hyu can't Jäger in it properly.”

I got a tactical oar between them. “No fighting in the dinghy,” I said. “You three have sunk one boat between you already tonight, and I'm not having you sink this one. It's public property.”

We reached the shore safely, the Jägers scrambled out onto the jetty, and I tied up the dinghy. “Could someone help me with NIMROD?” I asked. “He's very heavy.”

“Ja, hy help,” said Maxim, and lifted him easily out of the boat. He patted him on the head. “Nize doggie.”

NIMROD looked up at Maxim, evidently thinking. Then he spoke.

“Voof?” he suggested.


End file.
